-Press Release Pension Parishad Pension Parishad members have decried the manner in which the UPA-II government is appeasing the credit rating agencies and captains of finance and industry while ignoring millions of elderly and deprived people of their right to social security in this country New Delhi, 17 February 2014: Describing the Interim Budget for 2014-15 "as an absolute let-down", Nikhil Dey, speaking on behalf of the Pension...
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Budget 2014: Political move? UPA shifts power over huge spending to states
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: The next government at the Centre will have far less money to play with, thanks to something Chidambaram has done. He has transferred substantial control over spending on centrally-sponsored schemes such as employment guarantee and Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan to the states. In the coming year, the amount is Rs 3.4 lakh crore. State governments will be pleased. Political observers see it as a move to curry...
More »Spending on subsidies surged, education and health lagged during 10 years of UPA -Sidhartha
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: When finance minister P Chidambaram presents his first interim budget on Monday, he is expected to devote a significant chunk of his speech - which may be between 12 and 18 pages - to UPA government's spending on social sector schemes, especially health, education and rural development. But what is probably going to slip through is the fact that these sectors actually witnessed a comparatively...
More »Lokpal may become a parking lot for retired babus -Himanshi Dhawan
-The Times of India NEW DELHI: Will the Lokpal become just another retirement home for ex-bureaucrats? Government rules say only serving and retired secretary-level officers to the government of India and their equivalent can become non-judicial members, ensuring that the fledgling Lokpal goes the way of the Central Information Commission and power and telecom regulators like CERC and Trai. Describing this as "unfortunate" and "illegitimate", activists under the aegis of the National...
More »The promise of regularisation -Shahana Sheikh and Subhadra Banda
-The Hindu There is little transparency in the regularisation of unauthorised colonies in Delhi Earlier this week, acting on behalf of the Delhi government, the Chief Minister wrote a letter to the President asking for a probe against the former Chief Minister, reportedly for "alleged irregularities in the regularisation of unauthorised colonies in Delhi". This follows the Delhi Lokayukta's finding in November 2013 that the "issuance of the PRC [provisional regularisation certificates]...
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